The BOX Options Exchange has filed a request with the US Securities and Exchange Commission to establish a $1,500 per month booth fee for its recently open-outcry trading floor.
The new trading floor, which located in the Chicago Board of Trade Building in downtown Chicago, opened for trading on August 22 after receiving SEC approval on August 2.
Ed Boyle, BOX Options Exchange
In its current configuration, it can accommodate up to 40 people, Ed Boyle, CEO of BOX, told Markets Media.”It can be easily scaled for more should the need arise.”
Options exchange operator also seeks to specify that its current trading-floor permit fees for floor market makers and floor brokers entitle the participant to one booth space along with the three registered permits.
The exchange expects the booth space to be used by floor participants to perform various functions in support of floor-based trading activities on the exchange and house their workstations, according to the filing.
BOX officials note that all booth spaces will be uniform, identical in size and will contain an equal number of electrical outlets and data ports. For those floor participants who need more booth space will be required to pay an additional trading-floor booth space fee of $1,500 per month.
Although most of the equity options trading has gone electronic, save for the most illiquid trades, BOX officials have stated that providing manual trading would attract more traders to the more complex trades that happen on the exchange.
The exchange’s trading floor plan raised the hackles of the Chicago Board Options Exchange, Nasdaq, and the New York Stock Exchange that operate trading pits in Chicago, Philadelphia, as well as New York and San Francisco respectively earlier this summer.
Common complaints filed with the SEC prior to the regulator’s approval cited concerns over increasing the complexity of an already highly fragmented market and that the existence of the trading floor would make it easier for floor traders to chase commissions over best execution.
However, Boyle reportedly responded to the criticism by not requiring traders to post continuous electronic quotes if they have a floor presence.
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